Genghis Tron
Interview with Mookie Singerman
Words: Tony Cheslock

Appearing:
July 21, 2007
Thee Imperial, Jacksonville

July 22, 2007
Dotzer Park, Charlotte Harbor

July 23, 2007
Transitions Art Gallery, Tampa

July 24, 2007
BackBooth, Orlando

Like a war hammer dripping with liquid red velvet, Genghis Tron is equal parts brutal and danceable.  The Philadelphia-based band have perfected a refreshing take on the tired hardcore/death metal sound that has been mostly stagnant or at least way undergound for the past few years.  Recently signed to Relapse Records, they are in the midst of recording a new album and gearing up for four highly anticipated dates throughout Florida. 

REAX:  Genghis Tron has just been signed to Relapse Records. What is it like being involved with such an influential label? Do they give you freedom to achieve your visions as a band?
Mookie Singerman: It's pretty humbling.  Their roster, both past and present, reads like a laundry list of our favorite metal bands, so we're incredibly excited and flattered to be working with them.  They're also very adamant about bands having total creative freedom, so working with them certainly won't hamper our 'vision' as a band.  We have yet to release anything with them but we're pretty confident Relapse will take this band to places we couldn't have dreamed of when we first started out writing in Michael Sochynsky’s college bedroom.
 
REAX:  You've been playing only a few shows here and there (according to your website), is that in the interest of recording the new album and testing out new songs before you go into the studio?
MS:  Definitely.  We finished a 5-week U.S. tour with Kylesa in April and since then we've been fully occupied with writing the new record.  It takes us a long time to write because it's done almost entirely on computer programs--which can get pretty tedious.  We gave ourselves a September deadline to finish the record and we've been working non-stop to get it done by then.
 
REAX:  Do you have a name for the new record?
MS:  Not yet.  We're deciding between "Bed Bath & Beyond" or "Crate & Barrel."

REAX:  What is your relationship with the local hardcore scene in Philadelphia and how were you able to break away from what everyone else is doing there musically?  Was "your sound" a conscious decision or did it evolve into what it is now?
MS:  We actually just moved to Philadelphia last September, so a relationship with the Philly scene doesn't really exist.  We formed while we were in school in Poughkeepsie, NY, which is where we spent our formative years as a band, and we were pretty insular there as well.  I guess we've always kept our distance for several reasons--the most obvious being that we didn't really feel that we fit in too well with any of the local metalcore or hardcore scenes.  Our sound was a pretty conscious decision to fuse our love of electronic music and metal and just about every other genre we could pull from. 
 
REAX:  Is Kurt Ballou producing the next album and what impact did he have on the band's sound?
MS:  Yes, he's producing the next record.  He's a brilliant engineer and his know-how certainly brought a whole lot sonically to Dead Mountain Mouth that wasn't there when we recorded the demos ourselves.  It ended up being infinitely more brutal and heavy than we ever could have anticipated.  That being said, he didn't take too much of a producer role on the last record.  We're hoping the new one will have a lot more of his creative input.

REAX:  While you're not on the road, what typifies a day in the life of Genghis Tron these days?
MS:  Well, because of the self-imposed deadline to finish the record, we don't have time for jobs, so we're collectively living the life of a starving artist.  We wake up when we want, write all day in Hamilton's tiny bedroom, eat oatmeal, drink beer, go to sleep and repeat.   

REAX:  You will obviously be touring after the new record comes out; will you be playing larger venues from here on out?
MS:  I guess it depends who we're on tour with and how well the next record does.  I'd like to do a bank amphitheatre tour at this point next year- Bank of America Amphitheatre, Citibank Amphitheatre, Wachovia Amphitheatre, maybe even a cell phone company amphitheatre or two- but we're not there yet.  We'll continue to cross our fingers for that Maroon 5 support spot...
 
REAX:  I saw you guys play at Transitions Art Gallery in Tampa last summer and I was totally blown away. I loved that you guys were so close to the crowd and so much energy was shared. Do you prefer the more intimate performances at D.I.Y. venues?
MS:  Thanks!  That last Tampa show was especially nuts and we're really excited to be coming back.  Transitions Art Gallery is an especially awesome D.I.Y. venue that provides the Tampa community with an incredible skate park and gives them a really great all ages venue.  However, D.I.Y. is such a broad term--it also encompasses things like dreaded Denver warehouse squats where our tires nearly get slashed and our merch guy gets punched in the head.   It's a give and take.  We clearly love playing in venues where we can feed off of the crowd's energy, but sometimes D.I.Y. can just spell chaos...

www.genghistron.com